Tag Archives: Citizens’ Assembly on Social Care

A week after the original date set for the UK to leave the European Union, there is still no firm plan for how to do so. The Prime Minister has sought a further extension of the Article 50 process, but it remains unclear how the different factions in the House of Commons can be brought together. Jim Gallagher argues that the citizens’ assembly process might offer a way around the current impasse.

With parliament unable to agree away forward on Brexit, the only option other than ‘no deal’ is a long delay for the UK to rethink its approach. Europe is still open to this, but says it needs a ‘strong justification’.

Citizens’ Assemblies offer a new way to resolve the issue and help unite the country during that period.

A no plan Brexit and broken public trust

The Tory party’s search for a quick, simple fix, largely driven by its internal needs, has defined the Europe debate so far. Contrast this with Harold Macmillan’s decision to apply for membership in 1961, based on a deep and comprehensive analysis, or Labour’s 23 volumes on whether to join the euro. Little wonder Westminster and Whitehall failed to secure a workable agreement, and that few members of the public find it possible to support the options now on the table.

This present deadlock is reason enough to bring the public back into the debate. But, more importantly, we have not just a government unable to lead but a public unwilling to be led. 68% of people now feel none of the main political parties speaks for them. ‘Betrayal’ and ‘treason’ are the everyday language of debate. Remain supporters say the referendum was won by lies and stolen data; Leave supporters feel robbed of a clean break with Europe.

A last minute compromise deal, with far-reaching economic and social consequences, conjured up behind closed doors in Westminster, will not get public acceptance from either Remainers or Leavers. People already deeply distrust the Brexit political process. Continue reading →

As the debate about the UK’s relationship with the EU continues to dominate the political agenda, citizens’ assemblies have been mooted by several high profile figures as a possible way to break the Brexit impasse. Here Sarah Allan and Rebecca McKee explain how and why citizens’ assemblies are able to assist and improve the policy-making process through engaging and informing ordinary members of the public.

Citizens’ assemblies have been gathering more attention amongst politicians, the public, and the media in recent weeks. For some this model of public engagement is entirely new. Yet, the history of citizens’ assemblies and methods like them extends back to the 1970s. Since then they have been used around the world to bring together representative groups of the public to deliberate on controversial and complex issues. Countries that have had citizens’ assemblies include Canada, the United States, Australia and Belgium. Most famously Ireland’s citizens’ assembly and constitutional convention played key roles in change on abortion and gay marriage.

The core purpose of a citizens’ assembly is to give decision-makers access to the informed and considered views of the public. A citizens’ assembly can be said to have worked when these three factors are delivered to a high standard. We use the examples of the Citizens’ Assembly on Brexit (CAB) and the Citizens’ Assembly on Social Care (CASC) to show that it is possible to deliver on these principles.

‘The views of those that took part in our citizens’ assembly have been vital in informing our thinking and the model also provides a possible route for further public engagement and building the support that any reforms will need.’ Clive Betts MP, Chair of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Select Committee.

The public

Is it possible to recruit a representative group of participants?

The primary goal of citizens’ assembly recruitment is to secure a broadly representative sample of the population as assembly members. The population of interest varies depending on the assembly topic. CASC was commissioned to look at the devolved issue of social care, so participants were only recruited from England. CAB dealt with the UK’s exit from the EU, so its membership was UK-wide. Both topics were issues of policy so participants were restricted to those eligible to vote in either general elections for CASC, or the 2016 European Referendum for CAB. Continue reading →

Forty years after the creation of departmental select committees, it is beyond doubt that they have contributed significantly to the scrutiny of government. But could they be doing more? The House of Commons Liaison Committee has established an inquiry to answer this question. Dr Sarah Wollaston explains that this is a necessary task to ensure that committees continue to innovate and perform their crucial functions with the involvement of MPs, experts and the general public.

It is difficult to imagine a House of Commons without its select committees. They are places where MPs can come together and work across party divides, often showing parliament at its best. They are central to the scrutiny of government. They have the authority to question those with influence and power but are also forums where MPs engage with and listen to a range of voices, and provide a platform to those who might otherwise not be heard. Committee work provides an important focus for the working lives of many MPs, who can use them to develop and deploy their own expertise. But in fact this level and intensity of scrutiny of the government and other agencies of the state by parliament is a relatively recent phenomenon.

The departmental select committee system will celebrate its fortieth birthday in June this year. The Liaison Committee, which is made up of all the Chairs of the select committees, sees this anniversary as providing an unmissable opportunity to take stock and reflect on whether select committees are fulfilling their potential, and if not, to find what is stopping them. Do select committees do the right things, with the right people, resources, powers and outputs? What has worked well, and what could they do better?

The 1979 select committee reforms were heralded at the time as the start of a great new era. Norman St John Stevas, then Leader of the House, stated that the Commons was ‘embarking upon a series of changes that could constitute the most important parliamentary reforms of the century’. Although select committees had a long parliamentary history, their use had declined through the first half of the twentieth century. Writing in 1970, Bernard Crick, the political philosopher, noted that the government had resisted establishing a select committee system:

For one thing, Select Committees on matters of public policy have been thoroughly distrusted and disliked by the Whips; despite government majorities on them, they have an awkward tendency to develop cross-bench sentiment, and a shocking habit of regarding the Executive as guilty until it is proved innocent.Continue reading →

With just two months until exit day, it remains unclear what form Brexit will take. Could citizens’ assemblies provide some of the answers to the questions politicians have yet to resolve? Alan Renwick outlines the scenarios in which a citizens’ assembly could take place, and what it would need to be a success.

The idea that a citizens’ assembly could help resolve the Brexit impasse is picking up wide support. A diverse group of notable figures proposed it just before Christmas. MPs including Labour’s Stella Creasy and Lisa Nandy and the Green Party’s Caroline Lucas have backed it. So too has the Guardiannewspaper. Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown has put forward a plan for citizens’ assemblies as part of ‘a process of nationwide consultation and reflection’, which was endorsed in a post on this blog last week.

That citizens’ assemblies are gaining support as a way of reinvigorating our democracy is enormously welcome. A citizens’ assembly is a group of around 50–200 people who are randomly selected from the general public to reflect the make-up of the population as a whole. They meet over several weekends to learn about and deliberate on a policy question before reaching recommendations. As an excellent piece by Leo Benedictus in last week’s Guardian illustrates, such assemblies enable serious, informed reflection on important policy matters by members of the public. They foster conversations among people from diverse backgrounds and perspectives who normally wouldn’t even meet each other. If they are integrated effectively into the wider policy-making process, they can transform the quality of public debate and decision-making.

With parliament deadlocked, people are looking for alternative ways to break the Brexit impasse. Many have been suggested, from the Queen intervening to the formation of a government of national unity. Among the options is a citizens’ assembly (or similar deliberative process). Tim Hughes discusses four potential ways in which a citizens’ assembly could help break the current deadlock.

A citizens’ assembly is a body of citizens – typically 50 to 250 – that learn about an issue and deliberate over possible options, before reaching a collective decision. Like jury service, citizens are chosen at random to take part in the citizens’ assembly. Unlike jury service, they’re often also selected to be demographically representative of the wider population, forming what is called a ‘mini-public’. The idea is that the citizens’ assembly looks and feels like a miniature version of the wider public.

Citizens’ assemblies are fantastic tools for addressing challenging issues. They enable members of the public – not weighed down by party political interests or aspirations – to learn in depth about an issue through hearing from expert witnesses and discussions with people from all walks of life. And after that learning and deliberation, they reach a collective decision.

There is no more challenging issue at the moment than Brexit, so it’s unsurprising that citizens’ assemblies have been proposed as a possible solution. But while citizens’ assemblies have been used to tackle some very controversial issues – including abortion in Ireland – one has never been attempted in a political and media environment quite as febrile as the current Brexit debate. Continue reading →

The latest issue of Monitor, the Constitution Unit’s regular newsletter, was published today. The issue covers all of the major UK constitutional developments over the past four months, a period that has seen the EU (Withdrawal) Bill pass into law, a government White Paper on Brexit provoke numerous ministerial resignations, continuing investigations into the conduct of the EU referendum campaigns, and a failure to restore devolved government in Northern Ireland. Abroad, Ireland’s referendum on repeal of restrictions on abortion passed by an overwhelming majority, and Italy has a new government, the formation of which raised questions about the position and role of the country’s president. This post is the opening article from Monitor 69, and you can download the full issue on our website.

Political debate in the UK continues to be dominated by the fallout of the 2016 Brexit referendum. Both government and parliament are grappling with the detail of how Brexit can, and should, be realised.

Last year the House of Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee (PACAC) characterised the vote of June 2016 disapprovingly as a ‘bluff-call’ referendum, where the government puts something to the vote in the hope it would be defeated, without setting out clearly the consequences of change. As committee chair Bernard Jenkin said on our blog at the time, ‘there should be more clarity and planning by the government holding the referendum, so there is less of a crisis of uncertainty if they don’t get the answer they want, as in the EU referendum’. That crisis of uncertainty continues. One consequence is that both MPs and peers face claims of ‘betrayal’ for asking awkward questions, which cannot be good for democracy.

It is in this context that the Independent Commission on Referendums, established by the Constitution Unit last year, has recently issued its report. The Commission was set up following concerns about various recent referendums, in order to examine the role that such polls should play in the UK’s system of representative democracy, and how they can best be conducted and regulated. It comprised 12 senior politicians, journalists, public servants, and researchers, who spanned the major dividing lines in contemporary UK politics. The Commission’s report represents the most comprehensive review of referendums in the UK for 20 years. It follows a previous Commission established by the Unit, whose 1996 report helped lead to the first statutory regulation of referendums in 2000.Continue reading →

The Citizens’ Assembly on Social Care was the first of its kind to be commissioned by parliament in the UK. It builds on the work Involve did with the Constitution Unit on the Citizens’ Assembly on Brexit last September. Over two weekends 47 members of the public deliberated on how adult social care in England should be funded long-term. The recommendations will feed into the joint inquiry by the Health and Social Care Select Committee and the Housing, Communities and Local Government Select Committee. As Dr Rebecca McKee explains, this is another example of how the public are capable of engaging in complex topics and producing well informed and workable recommendations.

How should we pay for social care? This question has been the subject of much debate, with numerous proposals by successive governments, thinktanks, and others being published but never successfully implemented. Although there is consensus on the need for reform, exactly how to do it has fallen into what former Cabinet minister Charles Clarke has labelled the ‘too difficult box’. Later this year the government plans to publish its Green Paper on funding social care for older people. Ahead of this, the Commons Health and Social Care and the Housing, Communities and Local Government Select Committees are conducting a joint inquiry to develop a cross-party consensus on ideas for reforming the funding of this sector.

The Citizens’ Assembly on Social Care asked the question of how adult social care in England should be funded long-term. Assembly members were asked to look at adult social care for both people of working age and older adults. They reflected on questions such as how much individuals should have to pay themselves, how much should be covered by public funding, and whether personal assets, such as houses, should be included in calculations of what they might be expected to contribute. Continue reading →

The Constitution Unit in the Department of Political Science at University College London is the UK’s leading research body on constitutional change.

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